The present invention relates to the field of delivering medication to patients, more particularly to an integrated system for maximizing patient safety and caregiver productivity for medication delivery.
Modern medical care often involves the use of medical pump devices to deliver fluids and/or fluid medicine to patients. Medical pumps permit the controlled delivery of fluids to a patient, and such pumps have largely replaced gravity flow systems, primarily due to the pump's much greater accuracy in delivery rates and dosages, and due to the possibility for flexible yet controlled delivery schedules. However, modern medical devices, including medical pumps, can be complicated and time-consuming for caregivers to program. Medical facilities struggle to provide appropriate caregiver staffing levels and training while holding down the cost of medical care. Human errors in pump programming and other medication errors can have adverse or even deadly consequences for the patient.
Therefore, a principal object of this invention is to provide an integrated medication management system that reduces the risks of medication error and improves patient safety.
A further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system that improves caregiver productivity.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system that improves the accuracy of the medication delivery process by eliminating labor-intensive tasks that can lead to human errors.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system that relies on an electronically-transmitted medication order and machine readable indicia on the drug container, patient, and medication delivery device to insure the “five rights” of medication management, i.e., that the right medication is delivered to the right patient through the right route in the right dosage at the right time.
Another object of the invention is to provide the caregiver with a pass code or machine-readable indicia to insure that only an authorized individual caregiver can initiate a medication order and that an authorized caregiver must confirm the medication order prior to its administration to the patient.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system wherein the medical device receives delivery information electronically only through a medication management unit.
Another object of the invention is to provide medication management system wherein the medical device is preprogrammed and executes the medication order only after a user has validated delivery data.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system wherein the physical location of a medical device can be determined and pinpointed based on the last access node used by the medical device.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for adjusting a patient-specific rule set based on new patient conditions and/or recent lab results.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for determining drug-drug incompatibility between two medication orders for concurrent delivery (to the same patient at the same time) and/or in an unacceptably close time sequence.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for remotely sending an order or information to the medical device to modulate a planned or ongoing medication order and delivery thereof to the patient.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for automatically associating a medical device with a patient based on wireless transmission of a patient ID to the medical device, thereby establishing a patient area network.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for caching an updated drug library at the medical device to replace an existing drug library, during execution of a medication order.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for displaying a picture of the patient on a device within the system, such as at the medical device, for a caregiver to perform a visual validation of the right patient.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for evaluating the performance of multiple medical devices based on information from the multiple medical devices.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for evaluating the performance of one or more caregivers based on information from multiple medical devices.
Another object of the invention is to provide a medication management system for adjusting medical device output conveyed to a caregiver based on multiple factors.
These and other objects will be apparent to those skilled in the art.